Before I Sleep
by TripleC Squared
Summary: Post-Big Bang. Watching her sleep should have been the easiest thing he'd ever done. But Amy didn't just bring the Doctor back- he remembered everything now.


Two thousand years was a very long time.

An exhaustingly long time.

It was his wedding night, he should be happy. Deliriously happy, completely distracted, incapable of thinking of a time that never was.

But he could remember it now; Amy had dragged all the memories back with the Doctor. Given him back everything that had happened, because it couldn't remain unwritten if they wanted the Doctor back.

Two thousand years.

Two thousand years of waiting, of protecting her. Two thousand years awake and alone.

He remembered it all, remembered living it. Remembered each honey-thick moment as it passed.

And yet he could remember never leaving Leadworth, could remember just being and existing and loving Amy and nothing more uncommon than the occasional flash of something more. Something strange that passed in a blink. Like looking up at the sky and being surprised to see stars, just for a moment.

Like the crack in Amy's wall and the raggedy doctor Amy had so admired. Like a thousand half remembered dreams of impossible things.

Amy's face was pressed against his shoulder, Amy's hair tangled around his fingers. He could feel the steady beat of her heart, the soft, even breathing of sleep. Everyone lives happily ever after, right?

Only he could feel his own heartbeat, loud and alien inside his chest. A natural thing that had become unnatural in the two thousand years that never were.

It was hard not to think about it, now that he had time, hard to sleep when he hadn't slept in so very long - and yet he had always slept, hadn't he? Part of him was afraid if he closed his eyes, she'd vanish. He'd wake up and this would just be a dream and he'd be plastic again and alone.

Amy wrinkled her nose and he stilled, barely breathing. Afraid of waking her, afraid of her staying asleep. Complicated.

This should be the least complicated thing he'd ever done. This was what he'd waited for, what he'd wanted, what he'd allowed himself to dream about in the moments of utter silence through the centuries.

Her face smoothed and he relaxed, running his hand through her hair and marveling in the sensation of touching her.

She was beautiful. He loved her. Had loved her. Would always love her. Human or plastic, it didn't matter.

So many second chances, so many almost disasters. How many times had they almost died? He hadn't even been _born _twice. Either the universe hated them or something out there believed in meant to be. Personally he was putting his money on both, with them caught in some sort of cosmic tug-o-war between happily ever after and tragedy.

But this time they'd won through, despite everything. Despite lizard women with genocidal tendencies, despite cracks in time and exploding tardises, despite both of them dying once and all the stars in the sky going out.

Mr. Amy Pond, the Doctor had called him. First thing the man had said to him after rejoining existence. Typical. It had been on the tip of his tongue to tell the Doctor to mind his elders, but everything had been a confused swirl of chaos, memories of two millennia filling his head like an over flowing glass, that he hadn't managed to get the words out.

He leaned down and kissed her, a momentary impulse that he couldn't help but acknowledge. He could kiss her, and hold her. She was here, he was here. No reason not to indulge.

Two thousand years, waiting for her to wake up. Waiting for her to come back, waiting for the Doctor. He'd done a lot of waiting.

And for the moment, just this moment, nothing bad was happening.

"Why're you awake?" She looked muddled, sleepy. Amy had never managed to transition gracefully between sleep and wakefulness.

"Just thinking, go back to sleep." The words were hushed, soft, they were both whispering. Even though the only other person on the Tardis was the Doctor.

"I can hear them, rolling all around in your head. Cut it out." She made a tiny grumbling noise, one she'd never admit to being capable of while she was awake, burrowing her face in his shoulder.

"I missed you."

She grunted, nearly kicking the blanket off the bed as she shifted, eyes closed tightly against the lure of being awake. "Don't have to miss me now. Go to sleep." Her hand shifted, drifting down his chest and pressing to the spot where a long time ago and never at all Restac had shot him.

He covered her hand, and for a moment they simply stayed, quietly reaffirming that they were both alive and here and didn't need to be missed.

He could have said something, could have told her he loved her or that she was beautiful or a million other things that he'd wanted to say in the long ages he'd waited for her, but somehow, laying there with her hand pressed to his chest and his covering it, made anything he could have said seem cheap and flippant.

Happily ever after might be a myth, or something that was beyond their power to achieve, but he could believe in happy for the moment.


End file.
